Liberty And Social Media For All.

Have you ever wondered how elections were ran with out electricity back in the day. Information would take weeks, months, even years to get around the nation. With 35 minutes to go in this weeks resent polls, Sharron Angle, the Republican challenger to the Nevada Senate seat, facebook read “Thirty-five minutes to go-every vote is needed!” She also posted, ”You, your neighbor, your mother-in-law … GET OUT & vote, NV!”

This year, most major candidates had a Facebook page. Election night results went directly to smart phones. And everything — the campaigns, the ads, the voting — was filtered through social media.

The reverberations the Internet can have on an election cycle have been well-known at least since Howard Dean let out an unusual battle-cry during the 2004 presidential election. But 2010′s election was the first where social media was virtually everywhere.

Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare and others used their power to get out the vote, supplying easy links for locating one’s nearest polling place. Not all popular politicians on youtube win. Christine O’Donnell, the Tea Party candidate who ran for the Senate in Delaware, had the most-viewed politician channel on YouTube. Yeah she was the “I am not a witch” video.

Win or lose, no one can deny that social media is deeply embedded in the rhythms of campaigning. Again, this is just the beginning. In 2012 I’m pretty sure in saying that social media will be a standard in every candidates campaign. We have come a long way since the pony express days, but the way information is received and delivered makes you really wonder what is next.